Collaboration and Partnerships

Collaboration means working together with other people or organisations to create, or achieve, something of mutual benefit which enhances what either party could have achieved on their own. We embrace collaboration as a key enabler to achieving our mission of Working together to keep Bedfordshire safe and we have a strong track record of working with others to make a real difference to the communities across Bedfordshire and we will continue to explore opportunities to work together to improve our services.

The Policing and Crime Act 2017 places a legal duty on blue light services to collaborate efficiently and effectively. We work closely with our blue light colleagues in Bedfordshire Police and the East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust, as well as our local authority colleagues in Bedford Borough Council, Central Bedfordshire Council and Luton Borough Council. We also work in partnership with other fire and rescue services on both front line and support services, such as our shared strategic operational command arrangements and shared Information and Communications Technology service with Cambridgeshire Fire and Rescue Service. These arrangements have not only improved services but allowed us to make efficiency savings.

Our partnerships may either be statutory or non-statutory in nature. ‘Statutory’ partnerships are those where there is a legal duty for Bedfordshire Fire and Rescue Service to collaborate with other agencies to achieve certain goals, such as Community Safety Partnerships established under the Crime and Disorder Act 1998. ‘Non statutory’ partnerships are entered into voluntarily to support achieving organisational targets and goals. We aim to evaluate our partnerships regularly to ensure that they are effective in delivering the expected benefits and outcomes.